Handstand anyone? Cupcake with Sprinkles?

Simone’s “Person doing a handstand” for her Halloween costume.  Not the easiest costume to sit in…so (as in previous years) she had a couple back-up costumes that she cycled through during the day.

Naomi made many costumes this year but on the morning of Halloween she came up with this one.  When we got to school she had me cover her face with little colored marks for sprinkles.

Truth is, Naomi wears a costume to Christina Gwin’s Kindergarten class about once a week.  She favors the orange astronaut overalls or the man’s business suit or her lumberjack attire but now and then, she finds time in the morning to create a wonder woman or a red and black queen or an all white ice princess.

This year we did our trick or treating in Magnolia so that we could venture into the terrifying Alley of Darkness.  It does not look menacing in this photo but it was!  Those cute bouncy house looking things…are not bouncy houses. That is a ruse.  The minute you step past those, you are in the underworld.  The teachers from the Lawton school create this madness.  These professors are literally hiding under cars waiting for you. They then roll out to grab ankles or sneak up behind you in the darkness and yank your ponytails with a  devilish hisssssssss.  There were real chain saws smelling of fuel and cutting the air with their chilling burr burr burr.  Menacing sounds were everywhere and scary undead-types kept popping in and out of the heavy (fog machined) air.  Every time you started to breathe again, a monster from the underworld, would jump out and restart you screaming.  Hearing the screams, including our own, delivered the holy grail of Halloween, a kind of spooky cathartic-ism only had by being taken way over the edge!

The Alley of Darkness is hard to top, even though, just a block further is an ongoing zombie performance of “Triller” atop 16 gravestones.

This is where “thriller” later comes to life with about 12 performers.  Naomi made this her first stop.  Well…actually..a pile of leaves was her first stop.

Soft piles of beautiful red leaves this year.

Here are a few “in progress” snaps from Simone’s 2012 costume.  It went through many iterations…fuffy pink go-go dancer handstand to green cowboy with silver boots handstand.

Here are a few snaps from halloween costumes past. There were three ultra sweet whirling dervish looking creatures with mad scientists and skeletons hidden under their skirts and there was once an elf with curling shoes and there were a trio of pirates holding mermaids.

What should we create next year?